In a golf experiment, forcing amateurs to take a "safe" chip shot out of the woods was less effective than letting them attempt a "heroic" shot through trees. Amateurs frequently failed to execute the simple chip, costing more strokes. This shows that optimal strategy is entirely dependent on the performer's skill level.

The Warriors' practice facility has cameras that record every shot by each player. This data provides hyper-specific feedback on miss tendencies (left/right, long/short) and shot arc, enabling coaches to offer highly tailored development advice.

To get golfers and coaches to adopt the "Strokes Gained" metric, the PGA Tour presented them with two anonymized player rankings. Stakeholders consistently chose the ranking generated by the new metric as more accurate, leading to adoption without needing to explain the complex underlying analytics.

Resilience isn't a vague trait; it's a measurable ability to recover from setbacks. Golfer Scotty Scheffler bounces back from a bad hole with a good one 62% of the time, versus the tour average of 18%. This shows how a strong 'why' directly translates to superior, quantifiable performance under pressure.

Contrary to common advice, Greg Norman's coach had him hit the ball as hard as possible first, then work on accuracy. This pre-loaded power into his swing, allowing him to scale back for control later, rather than struggling to add power to an already precise but weak motion.

Mastery of a skill isn't about more brain activity, but more efficient activity. Experts transfer tasks from conscious effort ("software") to automated neural circuits ("hardware"), consuming fewer cognitive resources than a novice who is actively problem-solving.

Steve Levitt proposes a new golf scoring system that heavily weights eagles and birdies while giving zero points for double bogeys or worse. This incentivizes risk-taking and focuses players on their best moments, not their worst holes. It's a design principle for any activity: optimize the rules for user enjoyment.

Sue Bird argues that at the elite level, hard work is a given. The key to longevity is “smart practice”—mastering core skills early, then adopting low-impact training and film study to reduce physical wear and tear while still improving.

Greg Norman didn't just practice on perfect driving range lies. He deliberately practiced from difficult situations like divots, downhill lies, and hitting from his knees. This prepared him for any variable he might encounter during actual competition, a principle applicable beyond sports.